Ο κύλινδρος είναι αρχαίος τύπος χειρόγραφου που χρησιμοποιεί πάπυρο, περγαμηνή ή χαρτί με σκοπό την διάσωση και διάδοση γνώσης μέσω απλού ή εικονογραφημένου κειμένου. 

Ο κύλινδρος αποτελείται από μακρύ, στενόμακρο υλικό που οι άκρες του είναι τυλιγμένες σε δύο καρούλια, έτσι ώστε τυλίγοντας το ένα και ξετυλίγοντας το άλλο άκρο του να μπορούμε να δούμε σταδιακά το περιεχόμενό του, που συνήθως είναι μοιρασμένο σε τμήματα, όπως οι σελίδες των σημερινών βιβλίων.

Scrolls were the first form of editable record keeping texts, used in Eastern Mediterranean ancient Egyptian civilizations. Parchment scrolls were used by the Israelites among others before the codex or bound book with parchment pages was invented by the Romans, which became popular around the 1st century AD.^[2] Scrolls were more highly regarded than codices until well into Roman times.

The ink used in writing scrolls had to adhere to a surface that was rolled and unrolled, so special inks were developed. Even so, ink would slowly flake off scrolls.

Shorter piecesof parchment or paper are called rolls or rotuli, although usage of the term by modern historians varies with periods. Historians of the classical period tend to use rollinstead of scroll. Rolls may still be many meters or feet long, and were used in the medieval and Early Modern period in Europe and various West Asian cultures for administrative manuscript documents intended for various uses, including accounting, rent-rolls, legal agreements, and inventories. A distinction that sometimes applies is that the lines of writing in rotuli run across the width of the roll (that is to say, are parallel with any unrolled portion) rather than along the length, divided into page-like sections. Rolls may be wider than most scrolls, up to perhaps 60 cm or two feet wide. Rolls were often stored together in a special cupboard on shelves.